East Star Resources (LSE:EST) - Drilling Through 2027 on Kazakhstan Copper and Gold Assets

Recording date: 21st October 2026 Olive Resource Capital (TSXV:OC) used this Compass episode to share how its leadership assesses mining projects on the ground. Executive Chairman Derek Macpherson spoke from Georgetown after visiting Omai Gold Mines (TSXV:OMG) in Guyana, while President, CEO and Chief Investment Officer Samuel Pelaez spoke from central Uruguay near the projects of Sun Valley Minerals. Both companies are among Olive's largest investments, and both executives are directors of the company they visited. The framework starts with access. Investors should ask how a site is reached, whether existing roads and power could support an industrial operation and what would need upgrading before production. The arrival experience itself can signal whether mining matters in a country. In Guyana, mining suppliers advertise in the airport and a large Caterpillar dealership sits on the road into the capital. In Uruguay, the route to site uses paved highways with a high-voltage line alongside, and passes large quarries and cement plants. The second layer is process quality. Clean drill sites, an organised core shack and a disciplined safety induction indicate how a company will operate as it grows. Omai now runs six drill rigs, and Macpherson said core handling has become close to an industrial process. Sun Valley, ahead of its drilling, has set up protocols for 3,000 soil samples a month and an in-house laboratory, with samples also sent to independent laboratories. The third layer is geological reasoning. Macpherson's test is whether the geology team can explain to a non-geologist why it is drilling where it is, and whether it adapts as data arrives. Rigid models risk missing mineralisation. The fourth layer is footprint and line of sight. Visitors should find a high point and look for nearby towns or sensitive sites. Omai is a previously disturbed brownfield site in a country that is mostly rainforest. Sun Valley sits on former eucalyptus plantation land that is unsuitable for food crops, with regrowth screening noise and dust. The final layer is community and workforce. Sun Valley is training local junior hires under experienced specialists, buying locally and securing housing ahead of growth. A future Omai mine is expected to be camp-based, served by a new paved highway, with a historic workforce base in Linden and lasting goodwill from the former operation. For Sun Valley, the near-term catalysts are its expected TSXV listing under SUNV, following the filing of its final prospectus and conditional approval, and first drill results that will test its geological model. Kinross Gold holds a 14.9% interest. The company has no defined resource yet, and Uruguay lacks recent precedent for permitting modern metal mines. For Omai, the steady flow of assays from six rigs is the key item to watch. Macpherson also highlighted strong government support in Guyana, where he expects five large-scale gold operations by around 2030. Investors should weigh all of these observations against the guests' declared positions as directors and shareholders, and verify them against company disclosures. Sign up for Crux Investor: https://cruxinvestor.com/subscribe

Interview with Rupert Verco, Managing Director and CEO, Cobra Resources Our previous interview: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/posts/cobra-resources-lsecobr-two-new-zones-widen-manna-hill-copper-footprint-in-south-australia-12288 Recording date: 22nd September 2026 Cobra Resources plc (LSE:COBR) has moved its Manna Hill Copper Project in South Australia from visual indications to laboratory-confirmed discoveries. The first assays from its slim-line RC programme confirm copper across three targets, and they add the most direct evidence yet for a porphyry system beneath the known Blue Rose skarn. The headline result came from Blue Rose West. Drillhole MHRC0029 returned 32m at 0.70% Cu and 0.07 g/T Au from 52m, including 12m at 1.13% Cu from 56m and 4m at 1.33% Cu from 78m. What sets this hole apart is its setting. It sits outside the mineralised skarn, in strongly potassic altered rock, and against a large magnetic anomaly about 600m beyond the 1.6km of defined Blue Rose strike. Managing Director and CEO Rupert Verco described it as a step change in potential scale, and said the anomaly is possibly the porphyry intrusion itself. He pointed to other elevated elements and the team's improved understanding of local sediments as reasons to read the potassium as alteration rather than a naturally potassium-rich host. The two new skarns add the near-surface side of the story. Shadow Rose, about 200m south of Blue Rose, returned 58m at 0.46% Cu and 0.15 g/T Au from only 12m, including 42m at 0.56% Cu and 10m at 1.09% Cu. Verco said there is potentially a 2km strike zone to test along trend. Neptune Rose, 500m north, returned 10m at 0.39% Cu from 104m. Three more holes across these targets are awaiting assays. Thirty-two holes and more than 2,800m have been drilled, and the programme has been extended to 64 holes. Verco indicated roughly six to ten holes on the porphyry target, 15 to 20 at Blue Rose and Shadow Rose, and the first drilling at Netley Hill in over 20 years. Petrophysical work on earlier core will guide the choice of geophysics, and a drone magnetic survey is planned. On depth and processing, Verco said earlier diamond drilling hit sulphides to around 320m to 350m, and the Blue Rose West interval is largely sulphide from around 50m. That shows primary mineralisation beneath the oxides. Metallurgical testwork will follow this drilling. Management expects the sulphides to suit conventional flotation, while oxide processing options are still to be assessed. The stated priority is scale first and metallurgy second. Cobra reports that the programme is fully funded, helped by recent warrant exercises. Over the next 12 months, however, spending is expected to split roughly 60/40 toward the company's rare earth project, where an ISR pilot or small-scale production study is planned and strategic offtake partnerships are being considered for funding. For investors, the case now rests on continuity and orientation. The key watch-items are the pending assays, the six holes into the magnetic body, Netley Hill results and any data that firms up true widths. The main risks are the absence of a resource, untested metallurgy and competition for capital from the rare earth asset. Learn more: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/companies/cobra-resources Sign up for Crux Investor: https://cruxinvestor.com/subscribe

Interview with J.W. Dumont, President of Granada Gold Mine Recording date: 21st October 2026 Granada Gold Mine Inc. (TSXV:GGM) owns the past-producing Granada Gold Project near Rouyn-Noranda, Québec, alongside the Cadillac Break in the Abitibi gold belt. The property produced over 51,400 ounces from two shafts between 1930 and 1935 and was worked again by open pit in the 1990s. Despite this history and a large resource, the company has a market capitalisation of C$7.95 million and has struggled to carry its strategies through to completion. J.W. Dumont was appointed President on September 2026. He spent almost seven years in Côte d'Ivoire, where a mining-finance venture became an operating gold mine after its original model failed. At Granada, his mandate is a corporate turnaround built on capital discipline, more transparent communication and clearing legacy liabilities and reputational issues over the next three to 12 months. The board will be reshuffled, new strategic advisers added, and Dumont expects to become CEO if the market is receptive. The 2026 mineral resource estimate reports 890,600 ounces M&I at 1.73 g/t and 865,500 ounces Inferred at 1.34 g/t which are 64% and 90% higher than in 2022. The increase came from raising the gold price assumption to about US$4,270 per ounce and lowering cut-off grades, not from drilling. No holes have been drilled since 2022. Gold traded near US$4,166 per ounce as of October 2026, so the resource's sensitivity to lower prices is a live question. Dumont said the aim is a resource that holds up at multiple price levels, but that analysis has not been published. Drilling is the main lever. Granada applied for drill permits in October 2026 and plans infill to raise confidence in existing ounces, followed by extensions along strike and at depth. Dumont set an aspirational ceiling of 100,000 metres over two years, funded in tranches of 2 to 5 million. In practice he expects to start small. The scope, budget and schedule have not been announced. The exploration case is clear on paper. Some 87% of historical drilled metres sit within one kilometre of the Granada shafts. The 1.9 km between the Aukeko and Austin-Rouyn shafts has no drill holes, and only 48 holes pass 500 metres. One hole returned 107.8 g/t gold over 4 metres from 617 metres beneath the main pit, though Dumont deferred questions on true width and continuity to his technical team. Granada also holds optionality beyond drilling. A 2016 Certificate of Authorization covers four open pits. XRT ore sorting on a 500 kg sample delivered a 2.7-times grade uplift with 88% recovery, though the feed may not be representative. An Article 30 application for on-site gravity concentration remains in preparation, and DSO and toll milling are under evaluation with no agreement in place. For investors, the case rests on execution. The key watch-items are the drill permit decision, the size and pricing of financing at C$0.035 per share against 227.3 million shares outstanding, the board and CEO changes, and early drill results from the eastern trend and the deeper zones. Learn more: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/companies/granada-gold-mine Sign up for Crux Investor: https://cruxinvestor.com/subscribe

Interview with Heye Daun, President & CEO of Koryx Copper Our previous interview: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/posts/koryx-copper-tsxvkry-namibias-giant-copper-deposit-gets-a-major-upgrade-10548 Recording date: 20th October 2026 Koryx Copper S.A. (TSXV:KRY) is approaching the most important milestone in its turnaround of the Haib Copper Project in southern Namibia. President & CEO Heye Daun told Crux Investor during LME Week in London that the Pre-Feasibility Study will be published before the end of November 2026. He expects the results to be substantially better than the September 2025 PEA. Haib is a large Paleoproterozoic porphyry deposit with copper, molybdenum and gold, previously explored by Falconbridge, Rio Tinto and Teck. Daun’s team took control in 2024. The same group has a record of Namibian exits, including the $180 million sale of Auryx Gold to B2Gold in 2011 and the $390 million sale of Osino Resources to Yintai Gold in 2024. The March 2026 resource contains 744 million tonnes Indicated at 0.28% copper and 579 million tonnes Inferred at 0.24% copper. An infill programme of more than 55 kilometres has been completed to support the PFS. Daun cautioned that individual drill results can only move the average grade of such a large deposit so far. He pointed instead to higher-grade zones the mine plan can prioritise. The main technical change is the flowsheet. Heap leaching has been dropped from the base case after test work showed sulphide heap leaching was not viable at industrial scale. The PFS base case now crushes 48 Mtpa. Coarse particle flotation rejects about 12 Mtpa of low-grade gangue, leaving 36 Mtpa of higher-grade feed for a flotation circuit that includes Jameson cells. The PEA, by comparison, used a 28 Mtpa mill and 7 Mtpa of heap leaching. The PEA provides the baseline. It showed an after-tax NPV of $1.351 billion at 8% and $4.30 per pound copper, an IRR of 20.1%, development capital of $1.559 billion and a 3.9-year payback. It projected 92,000 tonnes per annum of payable copper over the first decade. Daun expects the PFS to show output well above 100,000 tonnes per annum, with capex between $1.5 billion and $2 billion. He said much of the capital estimate is already based on supplier quotes. Infrastructure risk has narrowed. Koryx has signed an MoA with NamPower for a 68-kilometre 220 kV grid connection, backed by solar and battery storage. It has also signed an MoU with NamWater for an Orange River supply scheme. Environmental applications were lodged in August and September 2026. Valuation is the core of the pitch. Koryx benchmarks itself at 0.24 times P/NAV, below a developer median of 0.28 times. It has about C$44.6 million in cash and no debt. Daun named project financing uncertainty as the largest barrier to a re-rating. He plans to address it in 2027 through financing certainty, technical endorsement, a strategic investor and broader institutional ownership. The development schedule points to a DFS and strategic options review in 2027, with first copper estimated in 2031. For investors, the near-term catalyst is the PFS itself. The longer-term test is whether Koryx can secure a credible funding partner for a multi-billion-dollar build. Learn more: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/companies/koryx-copper Sign up for Crux Investor: https://cruxinvestor.com/subscribe

Interview with Peter Bures, Chairman & CEO, and Michael Gentile, Strategic Advisor, of Silver Crown Royalties Recording date: 18th October 2026 Silver Crown Royalties (CBOE:SCRI | OTCQX:SLCRF) is a silver-only royalty company built around byproduct silver that does not appear in resource or reserve statements. Many gold and copper mines produce modest silver volumes. Operators are paid for that silver at the refinery but have never reported it, often because the mines predate post-Bre-X disclosure standards or because the amounts are too small to justify qualified-person sign-off. Without a reported resource, no royalty can be bought on those ounces. Silver Crown’s approach is to create them. The process starts with the operator’s refinery and metals-trader statements, reviewed under NDA. They give a payable silver-to-gold ratio grounded in actual sales. The company prefers producing mines and restarts, where that history exists. A transaction now under evaluation, and not yet signed, shows the structure. A mine with a 2:1 silver-to-gold ratio producing 15,000-20,000 oz of gold implies 30,000-40,000 oz of silver, and Silver Crown would seek a 30,000 oz annual minimum. Strategic Advisor Michael Gentile said the contracts are take-or-pay, so gold revenue covers the obligation if silver output dips. The company’s presentation adds staged investments and registration on title, and puts the royalty’s impact at about 2% of project revenue. The operator’s motivation is valuation. CEO Peter Bures said producers trade at 1-2x sales while royalty companies trade at 20-25x. Gentile framed it in NAV terms: smaller producers trade near 0.4x NAV, Silver Crown near 1x, and Franco-Nevada at 2x. A producer selling silver to Silver Crown crystallizes value on a sliver of revenue at a far higher multiple. Producers can take cash or shares. Bures said counterparties that took equity saw $1M nameplate deals grow to $3-4M in market value as the stock re-rated. Cost of capital is the constraint Gentile says he helps address. He had long avoided junior royalty companies because their discounted shares make acquisitions dilutive and the majors outbid them for quality assets. Silver Crown avoids that auction by originating its own royalties. Gentile likened the setup to Franco-Nevada in the 1980s, financing at about 5% and writing 25% IRR deals with little competition. Bures said cash flow turned positive in the second quarter of 2026 and credited Gentile’s investment with the share re-rating. Silver Crown Royalties lists 6 closed royalties across Canada, Peru, Brazil and Ecuador. It also cites a combined pipeline IRR above 25% and more than 10 active discussions at any time. The company estimates 2026 deliveries of 42,888-61,888 oz versus about 22,000 oz in 2025, and targets a first dividend in 2026. Bures expects 25% average returns to attract competitors eventually. He argued no royalty company under $1B market cap is creating new royalties today. He is also discussing parallel royalties with larger peers, splitting metals in the same orebody, though nothing is signed. The main risks are scale, counterparty performance, dependence on private data, silver price exposure and dilution from equity-paid deals and warrants. Near-term markers are the 30,000 oz transaction closing, delivery growth against the 2026 estimate, and any signed partnership. View Silver Crown Royalties' company profile: https://www.cruxinvestor.com/companies/silver-crown-royalties Sign up for Crux Investor: https://cruxinvestor.com/subscribe